In cylinder liquid fuel visualization during cold start

In recent years carburetor injection systems in spark ignited (SI) engines have been replaced with port-fuel injection systems, and as a result there has been a significant increase in the levels of hydrocarbon (HC) emissions from SI engines during their cold start period. The presence of liquid fuel in the combustion chamber, during a cold start, is believed to contribute significantly to the increased levels. This work uses planar laser induced fluorescence to visualize the development of liquid fuel in the cylinder of a firing SI engine. A closed valve injection strategy was used, as this is the strategy most commonly found in practice. Fluorescence from indolene and iso-octane doped with acetone and 3-pentanone was used to examine volatility effects. Images were taken on three planes through the cylinder and a number of post-processing techniques were used to analyze the results. The results were analyzed on both a time and crank-angle (CA) basis. Analysis on a crank-angle basis relates the location of liquid fuel entering the cylinder to engine events, and shows a maximum in the quantity of liquid fuel coming from the back of the intake valve at the crank angle position closest to the position of maximum valve lift. A semi-quantitative analysis based on the integration of the image intensities shows the time development of liquid fuel in the cylinder, and highlights the volatility effects.

Department dc:contributor.department

Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Mechanical Engineering

Grantor dc:publisher

Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Year dc:date.issued

1998

Author dc:creator

• Dawson, Mark A. (Mark Anthony), 1975-

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Simone Hochgreb.

• Mechanical Engineering

Statement dc:rights

• M.I.T. theses are protected by copyright. They may be viewed from this source for any purpose, but reproduction or distribution in any format is prohibited without written permission. See provided URL for inquiries about permission.

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/7582

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/47797

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:dspace.mit.edu:1721.1/47797